In the case of known vehicle treatment installations, in particular, self-operated vehicle washing installations, the driver must drive the vehicle to be treated into a specified treatment position. The vehicle is parked there, the driver gets out of the vehicle, and usually starts the treatment program at an input device provided for this purpose on the vehicle treatment installation. Then a treatment gantry with treatment devices arranged thereon, e.g., rotating horizontal and vertical washing brushes or high-pressure cleaning devices, moves once or multiple times over the vehicle starting at the vehicle front toward the vehicle rear end and executes the selected treatment program. In order to achieve optimal treatment, the vehicle must be brought as exactly as possible into the specified treatment position, usually up to a specified stop position in the driving-in direction of the vehicle and centered relative to the open treatment width between gantry posts of the treatment gantry perpendicular to the driving-in direction of the vehicle.
In the case of such vehicle treatment installations, however, the vehicle must be positioned by the driver himself as exactly as possible in the treatment position—which is different than drive-through installations that transport the vehicle in a guided and externally driven way. Many drivers, however, have great difficulties in driving the vehicle easily into the treatment position. Consequently, numerous attempts have already been made to guide the driver into the treatment position by means of different driving aids.
A simple device to help the driver to position the vehicle in the treatment position emerges from JP 60128047 A, which relates to a vehicle washing installation with a washing gantry. In order to bring a vehicle there into the correct treatment position, four rows of knob marks are arranged in the drive-in area of the vehicle washing installation on the base in the area of the wheels of the entering vehicle. So that the driver can recognize the position of his vehicle relative to these knob marks during the drive-in process, mirrors are arranged on the vertical gantry posts of the washing gantry and also on the gantry traverse running perpendicular and connecting these gantry posts. In this simple construction, there is a large disadvantage in that the viewing angle between the driver, mirrors, and the knob marks and vehicle changes continuously during the drive-in process due to the fixed mirrors. In this way, the reflected images of the knob marks and the vehicle that can be seen in the mirrors change continuously, so that the driver quickly becomes confused. If the vehicle enters incorrectly, the driving direction must be changed during the drive-in process, so the reflected images also change. Also, most drivers have problems in correctly reading the assignment of the vehicle movements displayed “mirror-inverted.” In this way, the steering correction is often in the wrong direction, so the incorrect position of the vehicle is amplified even more. The drive-in aid with mirrors also has the disadvantage that if there is not uniform lighting of the vehicle washing installation or if light is reflected by the mirrors toward the driver due to light reflections from the vehicle surfaces and vehicle panels, then the driver is temporarily or repeatedly blinded. In the humid environment of a vehicle washing installation, it is also a factor that the mirrors are quickly covered with condensation or dirtied by water drops, so that the mirror images are no longer visible or are only dimly visible.
An alternative drive-in aid according to the class is disclosed in EP 1 090 235 B1. There, the vehicle position of the entering vehicle is determined exactly with a complicated measurement arrangement. With this position data and desired position data stored in the controller of the vehicle washing installation, driving-direction instructions are calculated and then displayed to the driver, showing him in which direction he must steer in order to correctly position his vehicle if it is entering in an incorrect direction. Such complex systems require a high degree of measurement and computational expense, because the driving-direction instructions must be calculated and displayed in real time. In addition, it has been shown that the drivers of entering vehicles often interpret the displayed driving-direction instructions incorrectly or overreact to these instructions and over-steer. Especially for the case of over-steering, the short drive-in area of a vehicle treatment installation results in the vehicle being driven into a position significantly deviating from the desired treatment position, and these position errors are usually made even worse by multiple back-and-forth steering. The errors often can be corrected only by driving out of the treatment installation and driving in again. Often a vehicle is positioned worse due to these drive-in aids than if there were no drive-in aids.
From DE 20 2008 003 961 U1, a vehicle treatment installation is known with a housing that has one or more display devices, e.g., in the form of a flat monitor. Displays of vehicle treatment programs, advertisements, product offers by the installation operator, vehicle treatment tips, current images of the vehicle treatment being performed, or instructions on performing the vehicle treatment could be displayed in the display device. As the drive-in aid, however, this vehicle treatment installation still has the known instruction lights described above in the form of drive-forward and back-up arrows or a STOP light, leading to the problems described above when the vehicle is driven in.